We Are
by movedtopencildarts2
Summary: Oneshot booklet. Chapter 4 - Because, when you try to let go, there's always someone to drag you back up to the world. The world, in your case, is the world of Rikkaidai Tennis Club. Everyone's waiting for you to return. Uke Pair. -On Hiatus-
1. Echizen Ryoga ll The Orange Tree

**Characters: **Echizen Ryoga, Echizen Ryoma  
**Universe:** Movie 1: The Two Samurai  
**Warnings: **Mild Ryocest, spoilers for movie 1

* * *

At first, when his old man boss tells him that _Ryoma_'s coming, Ryoga's fingers shoot up to his neck and clench the little charm there. Not that he's going to admit that it's a clasp of one of Ryoma's old caps.

It's the next day when Ryoga hears a very wet spluttering for air from his spot at the highest deck by the main office, and he looks down to find a capped person being shoved into a pool. Ryoga would have snickered. The German student that Sakurafubuki hired snickers for him instead.

Ryoma is taller now, as tall as Ryoga was when he left.

It's also the day when Ryoga finds out that Ryoma's been forced into the same situation as him, Ryoma's teammates forced into the same situation as his, and it would have been only a few seconds away from Ryoga deciding he would beg for Sakurafubuki to _stop_ when Ryoma is shoved in front of him. The guard hisses menacingly when Ryoma stops and turns to look at his older brother, and Ryoga almost drops the orange he's been tossing.

The only words they've exchanged are empty; on Ryoga's part, at least. If you didn't know, you wouldn't be able to tell that they were from the same family at all, and Ryoga hates to admit that they're basically strangers now. But neither of them can help it. Maybe.

(Tennis allows you to see a grand dream, in a grand world... huh?)

This particular orange in his hand, notwithstanding its leathery skin and green stub of a stem, weighs like a tennis ball.

-------

Ryoga tosses the ball. It's in the salty, sea breeze, and it sways slightly to the right and covers the sun's sphere against the sky.

_It looks like an orange_, is Ryoga's first thought, and he turns to his little brother to see that his eyes are nowhere and unfocused. Ryoga wonders if the other is thinking the same thing. Hey, no hurt in asking, right?

"Hey, Chibisuke, remember the first time," Ryoga says, and Ryoma's eyes narrow. "The first time I," Ryoga serves high, but it's a few inches off where he wants it to be. "I stole your orange? Remember?"

The ball is up in the sky, somewhere on the seventeenth row of seats at its highest, before it dips down. Ryoma returns the shot easily.

Ryoga lobs the ball again, and this time he smiles as it flies up past all the rows of seats and up to the upper deck. But it has to go higher. "Don't tell me you've forgotten!"

The ball doesn't go in front of the sun's light just as easily as earlier, and Ryoga curses. Will they even be able to make it in time..?

It's all too sudden when the lamplights flicker to life as the ball flies in front of them, and the both of them immediately think, _It's like an orange._

A smirk worms its way on Ryoma's face, just like Ryoga's seen many times before, but it seems so... different, seeing it in person; different than those videos. Lively, even.

(There's a smile on Ryoga's face, Ryoma notes. It's infectious.) "I see."

Ryoma lobs the ball in the air, and it hits the sun's silhouette. It glints in the air, and against the bright blue of the sky, it looks like an orange on a tree, swaying in the wind.

* * *

**Words:** 569  
**A/N:** I'm not even going to try to explain what happened in the ending. It made me go WTF? Seriously, lay off the effects :/.


	2. Sanada Genichiro ll Action to Reaction

**Characters: **Sanada Genichiro, Yukimura Seiichi, a little Yanagi Renji

**Universe: **Anime

**Warnings:** Alpha Pair, spoilers for Yukimura's backstory, and for the Nationals

* * *

It's sickening. Sickening. Sickening. The way that, as he turns to look back, Yukimura falls to the floor in an almost graceful manner, like he'd planned it all along. Like, like, like he'd intended to do it. Like he was expecting it.

Sanada knows that he's saying something, barking out orders. Standard procedure. Call the ambulance. Call the ambulance. Don't move the neck. Check for pulse, count beats for ten seconds and multiply by six. Check body temperature. Are you okay, Yukimura? Are you okay? And it's all going so fast in a blur, and whenever Sanada tries to recall the event, it doesn't come back so easily. Not that he wants to remember.

It's also the first time the others have seen Sanada like that; panicked, losing his face of stone, but Yanagi knows the feeling of dread all too well as it rises up his throat to choke him. It's not like this is the first time he's seen this. And he wishes he'd never see it again.

-------

Yukimura is laughing. Yanagi is chuckling lowly. Sanada has a (very mild, mind you) smile on his face.

Okay, so maybe the fact that his name was scribbled hurriedly on the bottom of the list _again_ was not much of a cause for celebration. Maybe his name's there at the bottom because the coach forgot him. I mean, if you were really meant to be on the team for your exceptional skill, you wouldn't be forgotten for the list of regulars. Maybe it was some sort of sick tradition for the others to see Sanada's reaction.

"But hey," Yukimura says, smiling that blinding smile of his as Yanagi mutters another incomprehensible thing under his breath. "At least you made it, right? Now the three of us are stuck together again!"

No one is laughing. No one is chuckling. Sanada's face is set in some sort of horrified relapse as Yukimura's eyes roll back up his head and he falls to the floor. Everything happens so, so painfully slow; the man trying to keep Sanada from rushing to his friend, the distant wailing of sirens from his left, the train arriving beside him.

"Yukimura?" Sanada stretches out his hand, out to the boy on the stretcher, and suddenly his whole body feels sore. He wants to go home, throw himself in his bed, clutch the medal they've won last year, the one they'll be earning again for their second win, and say that it's going to be fine and that it's never happened. It's never happened. It's never happened

-------

(It's not happening.)

"Yukimura!"

It's kinda pathetic, now that Sanada thinks about it. It first happened during winter, it got lost for a year, and comes back again, during winter, at the train station. Like a broken record, or a song set on repeat, it happens again, and Sanada bitterly thinks that he should prepare a speed-dial for 119 in case it happens again next year, during high school.

It's kinda pathetic how they're relying so much on Yukimura, as if they'll never win without him. We are Rikkai. We are kings. We can stand on our own feet. We will win the Nationals, for the third time. You've survived through a lot, Yukimura, so why can't we?

And it's kinda funny how that doesn't turn out to be the case, and the scoreboard high in the air is almost mocking as it tells them that they've lost. Yukimura says it's his fault, again. It's not your fault, he says. Not your fault. He's said that before.

Sanada mechanically hands him a towel, a bottle of water, and smiles. Because it's not happening. It's not my fault. It's not happening.

-------

"It's just an off day," Yukimura, second year middle school, says. The words he say are soft, as if he's talking to himself, but Sanada and Yanagi and _everyone_ is there to hear. "It's nothing. It's fine. I'll get released by next month, at most, and... and we'll win the Nationals again. I won't drag you down. And if we lose, it will be my fault, not yours."

* * *

**Words: **686

**A/N: **Aaah! I still feel that this is unfinished. Leave a review? Taking character/s requests! Akutagawa Jirou is next~!

Edit: I re-upped the first two chapters because decided to butcher them. I'm so sorry! ;o;


	3. Akutagawa Jirou ll Surrounded by These

**Pairings: **NiouJirou, OshiGaku, AtoHiyo, ShishiChouta, a bunch of others implied

**Universe: **Anime

**Warnings: **Gayness abounds!

* * *

It was surprising when Gakuto said he'd been dating Yuushi. Actually, maybe not surprising. Maybe more like "Oh dear god you finally went out of the closet. Took long enough." Not that Jirou was a homophobe. It was just so painfully obvious, but since the couple didn't speak of it, then no one else did. Now here they were, frenching out in the open.

It was cute when Choutarou accidentally let his tongue slip and said he'd been going out with Shishido. Ootori was two times more blush-y and flail-y for the whole duration of practice, but Shishido didn't seem to mind and pulled out all the brakes on restraining his public displays.

It was ridiculous when Hiyoshi said he'd been dating Atobe.

"Why is everyone around me _gay_?!" Jirou wailed, and he threw up his arms in the air. "Every-single-one! I'm left with Kabaji!"

Kabaji must have ignored that or was just really good in not responding.

"Oh shut up, you twit," Atobe hissed, and his did his... his weird, hair flippy thing. "Act like a vice-captain, for once."

Jirou pouted. "But no one even _knows _that I'm vice-captain."

Atobe snorted in response. "Because you slept through the vice-captain welcoming party. It became a second welcome party for ore-sama."

Jirou slammed his face on his locker. "Sure, sure, and I'm the one at fault."

"You refused to wake up. We couldn't do anything much about that."

Shishido rolled his eyes. "How did homosexuality get to this topic again?"

Choutarou smiled. Very innocently. It was blinding. "Oh, Atobe-buchou mentioned something about Jirou not quite acting his position as vice-captain..."

"It was a rhetorical question, Chouta."

"Oh."

Shishido glanced up at Choutarou from above his shoulder and scowled when he realized that Choutarou was pouting.

"Hey, Chouta, come here."

Choutarou blinked, but complied anyway and found Shishido placing a short kiss on his lips. Choutarou blushed and sat on the the chair behind Shishido, resting his chin on the other's shoulder. Jirou winced as Shishido smirked at him.

"Dear god, the two of you are so... cheesy."

Yuushi shrugged. "Your loss. Get a boy."

Jirou scowled, and stood as his chair screeched noisily on the floor. "Get a _girl_, you mean."

Yuushi shrugged again, and continued reading his novel. It had a pink cover and had roses all over it. Ick.

"Sure," Gakuto interjected, "but you're going to be, well, out of place among us."

Jirou threw his hands up in the air and yelled in exasperation. "Sure! Whatever! I'm gonna get a girlfriend!"

-------

"Huh," Shishido said, huddling closer to Choutarou. Atobe's living room had quite the fireplace, but that was not what he was appraising. "Wouldn't have figured."

Rikkai was in the room with them. Both sides were eying each other suspiciously, sticking together with their respecting mates. Except for two.

Kabaji was, per usual, following Atobe around, so he didn't quite have a mate. Yukimura was in the hospital.

Niou was nibbling on Jirou's ear, and Jirou was very much awake. He wasn't talking either. A miracle!

"What have you done to our hyperactive Jirou?!" Gakuto wailed, pointing a finger accusingly at all the Rikkai foreigners in the room. "He's... He's awake! But he's not talking!"

Niou whispered "Puri~" in Jirou's ear and continued nibbling, except now it was on Jirou's neck. Jirou opened his mouth, and everyone looked at him expectantly, but he bit back the moan fighting to escape his throat.

"Niou's been like this forever anyway, so we can't quite complain..." Sanada said. He would have said _It would be an improvement had he stopped having five-second relationships, _but that was just stupid. Niou and Jirou have been going at it for a week and counting. A miracle!

"Both of us benefit from their relationship, one way or another, so keep quiet," Atobe said, leaning back on his plush armchair of high regality, while everyone else sat on the polar bear rug on the floor. "They're enjoying themselves, aren't they?"

A moan sounded from behind the couch, and no one dared look.

* * *

**Words: **704

**A/N: **Character requests are open! I repeat, character requests are open~!


	4. Yukimura Seiichi ll Damning Ourselves

**Characters: **Yukimura Seiichi, Sanada Genichiro, Yanagi Renji, Kirihara Akaya

**Pairings: **onesided!SanaYuki, onesided!YanaYuki, YukiKiri

**Universe: **Anime

**Warnings:** shounen-ai, spoilers for a lot of things

**For ChiyakoChan, who leaves encouraging words in her reviews :)**

**Read the footnotes (the numbers in square brackets) at the end! They are _IMPORTANT_. I can't stress this enough.**

* * *

The students are being likened to cherry blossoms again.

It's their third year as Rikkaidai middle school students. It's their third year as Rikkaidai tennis regulars. It's their last year as both.

Tennis is what's occupying their minds. The club will fall apart with the seniors gone. The tournament is nearing. What will we do? Will Rikkai lose? From kings, will we turn into servants? From demons, will we be tamed?

Yukimura barks out an order in the middle of the hushed whispers. "Are you doubting our future captain?" he says. He quickly follows it with an order for twenty laps, and when Kirihara arrives late, Yukimura gives him fifty. [1]

_**Act I. I Rest the Future on Your Shoulders has ended**_

Yukimura is not ignorant of the longing stares. When his eyes turn to meet the deep green stare boring into his back, Kirihara flushes and looks down at his feet. The ball whizzes past Kirihara's locks and clangs noisily on the chain-link fence.

"Kirihara, ten laps. Focus on the game."

Definitely, Yanagi isn't ignorant of Kirihara's behavior either. He gives the junior a knowing smile, to which Kirihara gives him a questioning glance before leaving to the court perimeter and starting with his laps.

"Yukimura," Yanagi calls. He walks up to his buchou and smiles enigmatically. "Ten laps? That's a thirty percent drop, compared to the number of laps you usually give out. Getting soft?"

Yukimura answers Yanagi's I-know-something-you-don't smile with a lethal one of this own. "Yanagi? Mind multiplying the number of laps assigned to Kirihara by seven?"

"...Seventy?"

Yukimura's grin stretches wider. "Seventy~ laps for you!"

Yanagi notes that this is the first time Yukimura has smiled since his hospitalization during their second year, and he succumbs to his fate of running laps with a halfhearted grin.

(It's a bit later when he comes across Kirihara, and the younger is brushing his fingertips against spots of black and blue on his torso.)

_**Act II. I Will Change has ended**_

Sanada knows all too well that Yukimura is definitely changing. His commands are soft, his hand shakes when he returns a smash, his breath comes out in wheezes. Or maybe, maybe Sanada is just being too paranoid, and he constantly tries to remind himself that Yukimura isn't some kind of glass doll.

He returns Yukimura's cross shot with a weakened Lightning.

Sanada can see it when Yukimura tries to return. His arm is too tense. When he breathes, it's as if he's forcing his body to. His wrist is shaking. His racket is blown away and clatters to the ground, and for a moment, the spotlight is on them.

"Are you fine, Yukimura?"

"I'm _fine_, Sanada," he hisses out. He picks up his racquet from the floor, and when he realizes that all the tennis club members are looking at him worriedly, he sighs. "...I'm sorry, Sanada. Student Council paperwork has taken its toll on me," Yukimura says, and at the end of his sentence he lets out a breathless chuckle. "Shall we continue?"

Sanada opts not to say anything and serves the ball. A few minutes after, practice ends, and Yanagi shares that the power in Yukimura's shots have decreased by half. The two are left hoping it isn't last year's winter repeating itself, and everyone bids goodbye and heads home.

When he thinks no one is looking, Yukimura lets out a breath he doesn't realize he's been holding and shudders, leaning on the nearest wall. His cheeks flush, his knees give way, and he forces himself to breathe.

It's not too long after that that he ends up hospitalized again.

_**Act III. I Am What I Will has ended**_

When Yukimura wakes up, there isn't anyone sitting on the visitor's chair. Not that he's expecting anyone to. It's around three, after all.

"Oh, you're awake..."

The heart rate monitor's beeps come faster than normal.

The door opens and closes to his right, and Yukimura smiles. "Kirihara, are you, by any chance, skipping practice?"

The visitor's chair screeches against the tile as Kirihara drags it to Yukimura's bedside. He takes a seat on the wooden chair and rests his head on the edge of Yukimura's bed. "...I was excused from practice for a week. I decided to visit you since I wasn't allowed to do anything."

The heart rate monitor beeps even faster.

At this, Yukimura lies on his side to face him. "Why? Did you get into an accident? We can't have you injured when the Regionals are near."

But Kirihara can't answer as the nurse ushers him out. [2] The beeping goes back into a normal pace after a few minutes, and even when the nurse tells him not to get worked up like that and leaves, Kirihara's already left.

* * *

The next day, no one comes to visit him, and the sunflowers on the end table start to wilt.

Maybe, just maybe, he shouldn't have been expecting too much. After all, the Regionals are drawing its jaws nearer by the second, and everyone is too busy practicing. Yukimura was just one among the several hundred members on the club; cutting one off won't affect anyone too much.

_They'll manage without me._

* * *

Kirihara comes back the day after. He staggers to the visitor's chair and, once again, drags it to Yukimura's bedside. A sigh escape his lips when he finally plops down on the seat.

"...You're limping," is all Yukimura says, but he's eying the bandages winding up Kirihara's arm. There's also a slight restraint when Kirihara moves his torso. "Is your chest bandaged too?"

"...Maybe."

Yukimura lets out a halfhearted chuckled. "Are you asking for laps, Kirihara?"

Kirihara winces guiltily. "...I fell down the stairs. I got a bit too tired after practice and ended up tripping."

Yukimura raises an eyebrow. "You mentioned that you were excused from practice for a week."

"...oh."

The silence stretches on. Kirihara rests his head on Yukimura's bed again, but Yukimura's hand in gently twirling the black locks he's buried his fingers in. Slowly, so slowly, that neither of them have realized until too late, Kirihara eases into the warm touch and buries his face in the sheets.

Kirihara is trying to convince his captain (and himself) that he isn't crying and tightens his jaw.

It's the day Yukimura learns that Kirihara thinks of school as home, going home as work, [3] and he realizes that maybe, maybe Kirihara is confused. Confused like him, here and now, almost giving up the life that he was blessed to own.

And Yukimura decides to stay and drag Kirihara back with him to living the life he's been living all along, and to go back to the world. The world that is the Rikkai Dai Middle School Tennis Club.

(Everyone is waiting for them.)

_**Act IV. I Wish You Well has ended**_

_Dear Kirihara,_

_Yanagi brings out the best in me._

_Sanada brings out the worst._

_You—_

The last line stretches on crookedly to the lower right corner from a half-completed 'o'.

Kirihara stuffs the note in his bag and makes his way to the hospital.

* * *

Kirihara is aware that he is risking a lot to say the words on the tip of his tongue. Yukimura is aware of the desperation in those green eyes in that they may never see each other again, and eggs him on.

"Mura-buchou?"

"Yes?"

The small piece of paper in Kirihara's hands crumple into a ball as Kirihara clenches his fingers into a fist. "I... I what?"

Yukimura smiles weakly.

Neither of them are stupid. Kirihara would be busy with his position as the team captain. Yukimura would leave for high school.

Yanagi would gently pluck the cherry blossom petals out of Yukimura's hair. Sanada's fingers would often accidentally brush against Yukimura's own. And even though neither Kirihara nor Yukimura are stupid, they take the most difficult path anyway. [4]

"You opened my eyes to the world."

_Whereas I would say that the final act has ended here, our journey continues as we live on, laugh on, and I am always relishing the little spark of warmth in my fingers in the form of his hand in mine._

* * *

**[1]** Future captain = Kirihara, seeing as he's the only second year to be a regular.

**[2]** Usually, when a patient in critical suddenly gets a raise in heart rate/brain activity, a nurse/doctor comes in to check immediately.

**[3]** I'm sorry if this is confusing you any, but it was pretty hard weaving it into the story slowly. It can be that Kirihara's being abused by a family member or a neighbor, and that he confessed he was considering suicide... Kinda like how Yukimura's been thinking that maybe the tennis club doesn't need him after all and he should just give up his life, including the fact that he thinks they should end his misery already. But in the end they stick together and try to find the light in each other. Or something. Gah.

Also, the club let Kirihara break for a week because, during the first act, Yanagi found that out, and he spilled, and Kirihara gets banhammer.

**[4]** Think about it. Your boyfriend is going to high school, where most of the faggotry (otherwise known as work) handed out by teachers increases by two, and where he's likely to be a sports club captain again. Your hands are full with taking care of a sports club. And you and your boyfriend know that your boyfriend has two other friends (who he will probably see two times more than you, seeing as they're in the same year) who have crushes on him.

...Hey, I think that's hard enough for a student. D:

**Words: **1389

**A/N:** Aaah! So many footnotes!

Back to the point; please request either a character/pairing/situation, because I'm cool and want my readers to be satisfied. Srsly. Oh, and a Ryoma/Yuuta is coming up next~ :3

Oh, and mind voting at my poll? It's over at my profile, if anyone's interested. Thanks~

(Sanada-baby wants you to click that magic review button. Tarundoru.)


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